“Why are you personally supporting the extradition of British citizen Richard O’Dwyer for solely linking to copyright-infringing works using an extradition treaty designed to combat terrorism and to bring terrorists to judgment in the USA?” Mozart asked.

The president replied: “I’m not personally doing anything; I want to make sure everybody understands. One of the ways our system works is that the president doesn’t get involved with prosecution decisions or extradition decisions and this has been a decision by the justice department.”

Obama spoke in greater depth on the contentious issue of internet piracy and copyright law, saying his administration was trying to “make sure that intellectual property is protected; we want to make sure that the creative works of people in this country aren’t expropriated but we want to do it in a way that’s consistent with internet freedom”.

O’Dwyer’s mother, Julia, said Obama had given a “typical politician’s response” but she was glad the question had been asked because it drew attention to the case.